46-2 - Dragon Ball Z [Ocean Dub] - Episode 22-23

Nappa has been functionally unstoppable for four episodes. Then Goku arrives. Then Nappa has approximately ninety seconds of screen time remaining.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover Ocean Dub Episodes 22 and 23: "Goku Strikes Back" and "Goku vs. Vegeta... A Saiyan Duel!"

"Goku Strikes Back" gives Nappa precisely as much of a fight as he deserves: Goku dodges his every attack with casual effort, lands a blow for each friend Nappa sent to the Other Dimension. Nappa crawls to Vegeta for help, but Vegeta throws him into the sky and destroys him for the crime of being weak, which is one of the series' early great character moments.

Then "Goku vs. Vegeta... A Saiyan Duel!" opens the real fight, and immediately establishes that these two are not comparable to anything that came before. Vegeta is stronger, faster, and strategically smarter than Nappa in every way. The episode also contains the Ocean Dub's infamous claim that Goku's father Bardock was "a brilliant scientist," which is not a description that applies to Bardock in any version of events, and which has never been satisfactorily explained.

We get into why this fight is so good, why early Vegeta just works, and the brilliant scientist situation.

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📌 Topics covered this episode:

– DBZ Ocean Dub Episode 22 "Goku Strikes Back" recap & review

– DBZ Ocean Dub Episode 23 "Goku vs. Vegeta... A Saiyan Duel!" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

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